THE STRANGE LOVE OF MARTHA IVERS **

The tagline could just as easily have read 'There's no-one better than Barbara when she's bad' and here Miss Stanwyck is as bad as can be. When not beating her aunt to death she's doing all she can to make sure her weak, alcoholic husband is re-elected DA while cheating on him with her childhood sweetheart. Lewis Milestone's "The Strange Love of Martha Ivers" is an overheated melodrama of small town corruption full of rotten characters and Barbara is the most rotten of all with hubbie Kirk Douglas not far behind. Van Heflin is the good guy who used to be a bad boy and Lizabeth Scott is the shop-soiled girl he falls for, (she's the film's weakest link). Milestone directed from a Robert Rossen screenplay and it's reasonably entertaining if a little convoluted. We could also be doing with a bit more of Stanwyck though both Heflin and Douglas, in his first film, are excellent and there's a nice supporting turn from Judith Anderson as the aunt who gets it. No classic then but very watchable.